Cross My Heart
by klingy12
Summary: Dan/Blair in the 60s. In NYC. In Mad Men's world. Dan and Blair are copywriters at rival agencies who clash over the Playtex account and much, much more. Crossover but always centered around Dair. Other GG characters appear too.
1. Chapter 1

_A Dair/Mad Men crossover? Insane, you say? Random, you say? Yes. This idea was born out of the Dair thread on the Couples Board at FanForum when we were all distraught over recent events and wondering what they could be like on a much, much better show than GG. The initial idea and premise came from the lovely Katie and I dedicate this mess/masterpiece? to her, because she's wonderful. Now, I of course do not own Dair, but I like to borrow them and put them to better use from time to time. And I definitely don't own Mad Men and can only hope I do it justice. I hope you enjoy, review (talk to me! tone, world, atmosphere, characterization...everything!) and come back for more updates. xoxo Air_

* * *

Blair Waldorf nodded politely to the other passengers in her elevator before stepping out onto her floor in the pristine Manhattan building where she now worked. Her heel clicked against the tile and for the first time it felt familiar instead of foreign. She no longer felt that click was invasive or jarring. She was beginning to settle in. It was her thirty-sixth day and she was starting to find a groove.

She reached a hand to push open the glass doors of Sterling Cooper Draper Price, but it swung open for her. Open sesame.

"Ladies first."

Blair craned her neck to find Ken Cosgrove, arm outstretched with intent to hold the door open for her. He had a warm smile.

"Thank you," she said and slowed her step once inside in order to exchange niceties.

She settled down behind her desk, puny and cramped in a corner with the rest of the copywriters.

"Good morning," she said in a chipper voice, more confident than tentative.

"I don't see what's so good about it," Ginsburg grumbled in his strong Brooklyn accent.

There were already about thirty files on her desk.

"Oh," Blair's voice fell at the prospect.

"Buck up, kiddo," Stan said, pulling at the waistband of his pants and leaning far back in his seat for a morning stretch. Blair grimaced at the sight. "It means mama bird's under duress and leaving you alone in the nest to spread your wings."

Blair batted her eyelashes and her lips extended into a tight smile. "And I suppose I'm the only _chick_ in the nest, as it were?" she asked saccharinely.

"What now?" Stan asked, already distracted by something on the ceiling.

But Ginsburg was quicker than he looked and chuckled. "Oh, she's sharp," he said and Blair had to fight hard to suppress a sly smile.

"What?" Stan said, now becoming aware that perhaps he was out of the loop. But before he could break into a whine Peggy barreled into the office in a huff, coffee in one hand and a folder under her other arm. Her hair was mussed and teeming with fly-aways and the collar of her blouse rumpled.

"Geez," Ginsburg said. "I'd say you look like you woke up on the wrong side of the bed but…"

"You don't look like you woke up in a bed at all," Stan finished.

"Stan, I cannot put up with your bullshit right now," Peggy snapped.

Blair quickly ejected from her seat and hooked her hand into the crevice of Peggy's elbow. "I have an idea," she said. "Let's go freshen up. My mother always says a splash of cold water is just as effective but far more refreshing than a slap in the face."

The two women settled into the ladies' room together, Peggy's hip rested her weight against the rim of the sink. Blair wet her fingertips and began to smooth out Peggy's frazzled hair.

"Why are you doing this?" Peggy asked.

Blair prepared her most soothing, calming voice. "Let's just say I have a thing for proper grooming," she said. "Rough night?"

Peggy's shoulders slumped. "Playtex is killing me. And Ginsburg is _not_ helping." She waved her hand dismissively. "He's very old world."

Blair was smoothing out Peggy's collar when she caught her looking on anxiously. She was biting the inside of her cheek and tapping her foot and making it very hard for Blair to help her.

She sighed in exasperation. "Look, I promise I can handle all of the work on my desk," Blair said and Peggy reeled back the slightest bit at her force.

"I wasn't implying—"

"It's okay. Just worry about Playtex," Blair said with a smile. She patted her shoulders. All done.

Blair and Peggy were back en route to the conference room, and Blair desperately wanted to break away for a cup of coffee but thought it better to remain in step when—

"Blair," Ken Cosgrove's voice called out to her and she jumped.

She swiveled around on her toes and tried to recover, willing the spike in her heart rate to calm. "Hi, Mr. Cosgrove," she said.

"Don wants to see you in his office," Ken said. He was always cheery, with a spring in his step, but it was never overbearing. For a moment Blair wanted to wring his neck. How could he be so nonchalant about delivering that message? She'd hardly even spoken to Don and now she was being beckoned to his office?

"Oh," she said, flustered. "Of…of course." She caught Peggy giving her a pointed look before she shuffled down the hall to follow Ken.

The door clicked shut behind her. Don's office was pristine, quiet. She feared it would echo.

"Hello, Mr. Draper," she said as he shuffled a pile of papers at his desk and Ken trailed around her to sit on the couch.

"Playtex is taking meetings with other firms. They're unhappy," Don said. Right to the point.

Blair wasn't sure why he felt the need to tell her this, she really only knew one thing about the Playtex account. "Peggy's been running herself ragged. I'm sure she'll have something soon enough—"

"Peggy needs to go home for more than four hours a night," Don said.

Ken cleared his throat from the couch. "Uhh, if you don't mind my asking, what kind of bra do you wear?"

Blair hesitated. Her eyes shifted between the men, trying to figure out their game. She was no longer feeling very comfortable. She almost crossed her arms but caught herself and thought better of it, bringing them back to her sides and smoothing out her already smooth skirt.

"What he means is—we need fresh eyes on this. And we need a woman," Don explained.

Blair snapped back to life. "Oh! Yes, yes I do actually wear Playtex. Yes." She cut herself off before she could run on any longer and say one too many yesses.

"Good," Don said. "You'll take the new model home. Come in with some initial ideas tomorrow."

Blair grinned, so much so that her cheeks hurt. On day thirty-six, she'd been assigned her first account to lead.

* * *

Daniel Humphrey was in the middle of a very important aircraft-engineering project when he was rudely interrupted by a firm rapping across his open office door.

"Got a minute?" a smooth, deep voice asked. It was Nate Archibald, a junior account man at BBDO.

"Hey, check this out," Dan said, removing his feet from his desk and planting them on the floor before sailing a paper airplane across the room. It took a nose-dive somewhere between the sofa and Nate's feet and Dan shrugged at its sudden, yet anticlimactic failure.

Nate shifted his gaze from the floor back to Dan. "I've landed a meeting with Playtex, you up for the job?" He held out his arms, inviting congratulations but Dan frowned.

"Like…tampons?" he asked.

"Like bras, dumbass," Nate said with a smile.

Dan felt nervous excitement build up in his chest and then a curious skepticism. "Isn't that Sterling Cooper Draper Price's account?"

"It sure is," Nate said with an impish smile.

"Holy shit," Dan said softly, his gaze transfixed on some mark on the wall that grew hazy and out of focus.

"You know what this means, don't you?" Nate asked.

Of course he knew what it meant. It meant he had the chance to steal this campaign away from the one and only Don Draper. And though he liked to pride himself on his immense superiority to most copywriters and ad men, Draper was not one with which to regard with an inch of arrogance or bravado.

"It means we're collecting research tonight," Nate continued. "Huh? Soho? Drinks. Dancing. Getting women of…_varying_…endowments to show us their braziers in order to help us with our oh-so-important-cause?"

Dan whipped his hand behind his ear and materialized with a pencil that he pointed in Nate's direction. "I like the way you think, Archibald."

* * *

Blair stood with her hands on her hips in front of her vanity mirror in her Upper East Side apartment. It was nine at night and she'd been making various gestures and striking various poses in the mirror for two hours. She had on her slip and the new Playtex bra that Ken had given her to take home, and despite all of her efforts, she couldn't think of any remotely exciting way to sell this thing. Sure, it lifted without much padding, but in truth she needed padding. And otherwise it was just a plain old regular bra. She wore them every day, there was nothing exciting about them.

This was getting nowhere.

When she walked into the bar in Soho she had one purpose and one purpose only. Find a promising male, flirt shamelessly, let him think he's lucky enough to be getting her blouse off, and proceed to interview him.

She sat at the bar and ordered a gin martini, coyly eyed the patrons sitting to her left and right and caught the eye of two men nearly instantaneously. One was wearing a suit, blonde and had a dashing smile. He was almost too pretty. The other had dark brown hair combed over fashionably, but the grease used to tame it was slowly losing out to a few curly tendrils along his forehead. He had on a hideous (to her) tweed like jacket, cream button down and slacks. But he had a jaw line to die for and his eyes were deep and dark.

The bar was dim and hazy with smoke but once she made eye contact with the man in the suit, she saw him tap the other one's arm and they stood up, making their way over to her.

"Buy you a drink?" The one in the suit asked. They had her sandwiched, one standing on each side of her.

"Sure, this one cost five dollars," she said with a touch of condescension and raised her nearly full martini glass, but he didn't seem to pick up. The other one chuckled softly.

The man in the suit delivered a shining black wallet from the inside pocket of his jacket and delivered a crisp five on the counter. "I'm Nate Archibald and this is Daniel Humphrey. Pleasure," he said and extended a hand.

"Dan," the other one corrected indignantly and Blair shot him a sidelong once over.

Blair shook Nate's hand with a feather light and dainty hand. "Blair," she said. "Blair Waldorf."

Nate leaned against the bar. "Now, Blair Waldorf, what's a nice girl like you doing at a place like this?"

It's true that this particular bar was not very well known for its ability to uphold a sense of moral character. One did not go here to go wife hunting. And everyone knew it. It was why she had chosen the damn place.

She let out a small, incredulous scoff. "Nice has never been a word prescribed to me, Mr. Archibald. You can save your flattery for a more naïve and…frightening insecure girl. There are about ten of them in here, waiting to be hunted."

She caught the other man…Dan…bring his hand to his mouth and try to suppress a laugh at his friend's expense. Nate's brow furrowed and it was clear he was unused to such prickly creatures as herself. She felt bad for an instant, thinking him a perfectly nice man.

"Now," she continued commandingly, down to business. "Given that it's now been established that I'm not very nice, I'm obviously here alone and my next course of action is to ask one of you fine young men to show me to the ladies' room under the pretense that I'm too helpless to find it alone…"

She looked pointedly back and forth between the two of them.

Nate was lost. Dan was intrigued.

* * *

Dan slammed her against the floral wallpaper of the ladies powder room and crushed his lips upon hers. And she didn't just succumb to his intensity, but matched it, dueled with him and surged forward, ravaging him equally.

He pulled away, breathing heavily and overwhelmed by her immense life force. His lips explored her jaw line and along her neck, and he delighted in the staccato gasps she emitted.

"You're so…" he kissed the groove of her collarbone. Beautiful. Strong. Smart. "Peculiar."

He felt her stiffen underneath his palms. Peculiar?

"Peculiar?" she echoed his brain.

Dan squeezed his eyes shut, mentally slapped himself, and detached from where his lips had been exploring.

He met her gaze. "Well you know…peculiar. Uh, let's see…synonyms include atypical, curious…" Dan fumbled over his explanation and Blair cocked an eyebrow. As he struggled to find more words with a positive spin, she began to play with the top button of her blouse.

"Uncommon…" Dan continued, intent on saving the situation.

"Strange. Weird. Eccentric," Blair interjected and soon his stare was drawn to the fact that with each pointed word she was undoing a button. "Abnormal." Button. "Odd." Button. "Unconventional?" She finished with the last and slowly peeled her blouse back.

Dan gulped. What a woman. What a….

"What a….what are you wearing?" he asked, stumbling a little over his words. But it wasn't the allure of her breasts that caused his collar to tighten.

She was wearing _the _bra. As yet undistributed for retail purposes. It was simple. White, functional, not overly sexy. Though it had two cross-crossed seams in the front that drew the eye right to the center and accentuated the cleavage. It was a simple, yet effective design. And did it ever look amazing on Blair…what was her last name? Waldorf.

A second ago she was a feisty brunette of loose moral character and a sharp tongue. Now she was the enemy. The competition. Possibly a spy.

He heard a giggle out on the perimeter of his senses and snapped back to the present to find Blair's shoulders curling forward in amusement.

"Do you like it?" she asked coyly. "I just got it today."

Dan's lips turned up into a half smile. So she was playing some sort of game here. He'll play along too.

"I do," he answered and took the liberty to lean in once again and nibble at her neck. His hands roamed over her waist and felt the coolness of her bare stomach and finally palmed her breasts through the fabric of her bra.

"Mmm," she purred. "What would say are its best qualities? From a man's perspective I mean."

He pulled himself back again and creased the lines on his forehead with considerable suspicion. He knew he couldn't answer her; it'd give her ideas. And ideas where the endgame of this business.

"What's your angle?" he asked and her eyes widened. Her lips parted slightly in either offense or feigned offense to mask how entirely caught she was.

"Excuse me?" she said haughtily. "I don't…I…nothing," she ended shrilly.

"I don't believe you," he said flatly. They were still close, cramped even, in the small little powder room and his sudden harshness only accentuated their close quarters and drained the oxygen from the space. Her chest was heaving up and down and his eyes locked her into a dead stare.

"Cross my heart," she said in a near whisper before she reached a hand out and cautiously snaked her fingers around his and drew his arm up close to her. She gripped two of his fingers and guided him to her bosom, miming the motion to cross her heart along the criss-crossed seams of her bra.

Her other hand grasped the back of his neck and she surged forward, trying to rectify whatever damage she thought she had done. Her lips fell open and she searched for his, but he held her in place.

"What do you do?" he asked. "For a living?"

"What do you do?" she whispered against his ear, hot breath curling over him.

"I'm a writer," he said, softening. His resolve was about to crumble.

"I'm in advertising," she said.

There it was. Her hands were exploring his chest through his shirt when he gripped each of her wrists in a desperate attempt to get her to stop.

"What is it?" she asked, trying to hide the alarm in her voice, and it sounded meek and cracked a little. He'd say it was so unlike her, but he didn't know what she was like.

"I have to go," he said coldly and began to push his way passed her towards the door. He jiggled the handle much too excitedly before bolting out without further explanation.

He had an idea.

* * *

_TBC  
_

_p.s. Did I pull it off?_


	2. Chapter 2

_Woooow so I picked this back up again! After the devastating murder of our poor ship, plus graduation college, moving across the country and getting a full time job - I haven't been writing at all. I've been lacking in stretching my creative muscle since I started work and I figure hell, why not? Plus, this fic was kind of prophetic. It's now more than ever that Dair need to live on in a different, much more quality universe, no? So, without further ado, here is more Dair/Mad Men! I'm trying to write it as if I were writing their storylines in episodes. I'm trying to pull back on the inner monologue and focus on actions and tone to develop characterization in keeping with the genius of Mad Men, but let me know if something's missing. Also my writing is probably mad rusty. Forgive me! xoxo Air_

* * *

Blair slumped over her desk, elbows unceremoniously holding her weight upon it. Her palm held her chin as she stared blankly out the window.

"It's snowing," she said plainly, flatly.

The others looked up, the same lethargic expressions across their faces as she had. It had been a grueling month. Playtex was now a distant memory. Blair had presented Don with three concepts for that campaign that she herself had deemed great, not to mention validation from a particularly prickly Peggy who seemed to be jealous.

But BBDO had gotten to them before they'd even had a chance to counter. Pete had been furious, Peggy even more so.

But no matter, she'd gotten a chance to do other work—and the first time she saw one of her slogans in a magazine ad she'd nearly screamed at the hair salon.

"Perfect," Peggy said with a healthy amount of sarcasm.

It was a gray day, sure, but Blair was starting to crush under the eternal cynicism and ennui of her coworkers, and it was too cramped of a space to ignore.

"I've never met anyone who hated the first snowfall of the year before," Blair said in an absentminded way that covered up most of the distaste underneath.

Stan snickered. "If you're implying Peggy's a Grinch, you'd be absolutely on the ball," he said.

Blair smiled a thin, appreciative smile. She could practically hear Peggy's eye roll and anticipated whatever retort she may have—but Ginsburg groaned dramatically before she could delight in the misery of the miserable.

Instead, Peggy chimed in, eyes twinkling playfully. "All right, time to pay-up, Ginsburg," she said and extended an open palm and wiggled her fingers.

Ginsburg dug into his pockets, a sour expression on his face.

"What's going on?" Blair asked.

"The first Christmas reference," Ginsburg said, producing nothing from his pockets. "We had a bet. Look, I don't have any cash. How about I take everyone out for a drink tonight?"

"I don't know," Peggy said.

"Come on," Ginsburg whined. "Since when does a Jew offer to pay for anything? You're missing out on a once in a lifetime chance, I gotta tell ya. Rarer than a freaking comet."

Before Creative could escape to their now much anticipated after work getaway—the anticipation had actually managed to lift spirits—the partners had scheduled a company wide meeting, the first since Blair had started working there.

She didn't think she had yet seen Roger Sterling, Bert Cooper, Don Draper, Lane Pryce and Pete Campbell in one room. It must be important. She side-eyed Joan, who seemed to be ever in the know, and somehow she found she was supremely jealous of that.

"Good news for the holidays my friends," Lane began in a chipper, clipped British accent. "Despite our unfortunate loss of Playtex, we've done exceptionally well over the past few months. Thanks to a healthy competition between Mr. Campbell and Mr. Sterling, we've brought in bounds of business—"

Lane blushed as he was cut off by a sporadic applause. He nodded bashfully.

"We should keep a tally," Don broke in casually and drew a nice bout of laughter.

"However—" Lane continued, clearing his throat.

"Uh-oh," Harry said.

"—we now, here at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, cannot efficiently manage the workload and thus, we will be expanding after the Holidays," he concluded.

"Are you serious?" Peggy asked incredulously.

"Quite, my dear," Lane said.

"Sorry, sweetheart, we all know how much you love avoiding that beatnik boyfriend of yours, but you'll have to go home to the wife in time for dinner like the rest of us," Roger said dryly, drawing his lowball of amber liquid to his lips with a smirk. Peggy glowered at him.

Blair was looking quite forward to a break from the office until New Years.

* * *

"Cheers my friend," Nate saluted as low-ball clinked against low-ball. He took a swig and Dan followed by downing his entirely. When he set it down on the round table at his knees he spotted a waiter and raised his finger up to signal another.

"I must admit, it feels good," Dan said. "I think I've only sold about sixty percent of my soul to the devil."

"Ahhh, see that's the problem," Nate admonished as he reached for a cigarette between the material of his suit.

"What is?" Dan asked as a new drink materialized before him.

"You still believe that people have souls," Nate answered. "And speak of the devil!" His eyes swept up and over Dan, who turned in his seat to find two men weaving through the chairs of the bar.

"If it isn't Pete Campbell himself," Nate said and got up to extend a firm handshake.

"Little Nate Archibald, look at you now," Pete said with a warm, if practiced enthusiasm.

Dan hung in the dead air for an overly long second before Nate remembered his good breeding and introduced the two. It turned out Campbell was an old upper crust family friend—and worked in advertising as well. At Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce no less. He was a junior partner. So when Pete invited them to sit at his pre-reserved table with a slew of porky self-congratulating men Dan soured. He didn't particularly want to talk shop.

So he continued to order his Old Fashioned and listened to tales of racquetball at the country club and lascivious stories of wining and dining clients.

"So any notables under your belt yet, Daniel?" Pete asked.

"That's actually what we're out here celebrating," Nate said. Dan waited for him to explain and was again left hanging in dead, awkward air. Pete's large, beady eyes were looking at him expectantly and yet he said nothing.

"Go on, tell him," Nate said as if encouraging a scared kid to walk the plank of a diving board.

"Uhhhh, yes. Actually," Dan began unceremoniously. "We're celebrating an expansion."

Pete waited. "Of…what?"

"Huh?" Dan blurted out.

"Well Dan here won us Playtex from you, funnily enough. And they liked the slogan so much that they've decided to green light a television ad based on it," Nate explained.

"So you're the man." Pete chuckled and shook his head. "I'm impressed. Tell me. How'd you come up with it? Because I have to say, for a boring old thing like that it really pops."

"That's the kicker," Nate said excitedly. Dan's insides were a mess of confusion at this entire situation.

"Go ahead, he'll love it," Nate said and turned to Pete. "You're going to love this."

Dan cleared his throat, leaned forward and rubbed his hands together. "Well, Pete—" he began. "It's a little ironic—and I can say ironic because I'm a writer—I actually got the idea from one of yours."

Pete's eyes widened. "A defector? Do tell."

"Better," Nate said.

"Nate and I went out one night to do a little…hardware research." That drew a slimy smile from Pete, who undoubtedly understood and approved. "And what are the odds I end up in the powder room with a girl wearing the very bra _I_ was assigned. The very bra it seemed that was in the possession of only BBDO and your very own SDCP." Dan swept back in his seat and let the implication sink in. "I guess your man was doing some field research of her own."

Pete chuckled again. "You smarmy bastard you stole the idea from her?"

"Oh no," Nate said from the peanut gallery. "No no no."

Dan sipped his drink and relished in holding their attention so grippingly. He smiled as he set his drink back down. "She was a sly one. She threw me for a loop I gotta tell you, and I let my suspicions fly."

"Did she…?" Pete asked.

"Not a clue," Dan said. "Anyway, she swore she wasn't pulling a fast one on me and she did this little thing where she led my hand like this—" Dan made a motion with his fingers at his chest. "—and she said…._cross my heart." _Dan threw up the palms of his hands as if to finish with a "voila".

"Holy shit," Pete said. "That is some story."

Nate began a slow, dramatic clap. "So thank you, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, for providing your _very_ best inspiration to Daniel over here."

Nate raised a glass for a toast.

After Dan grimaced down his final swig he remembered something.

"Who was she by the way? Do you know her?"

Pete thought for a moment. "If I remember correctly, our new girl, Blair….Waldorf was on Playtex. Her father plays golf with Roger Sterling, the bastard. I don't know anything else other than her ass looks great when she walks by my office."

Pete Campbell winked.

* * *

It was New Years Eve in New York City and Blair Waldorf was….at a work party. A work party at Don and Megan Draper's penthouse apartment, which wasn't all that bad, but when you've grown up celebrating the passing of time at the likes of the Waldorf Astoria and The Four Seasons there was something to be missed.

Not to mention her date had cancelled on her last minute, she'd just gotten into an argument with her mother who had called long distance from Paris just to criticize her, and for some reason unknown to man, the man she'd met at a sleazy SoHo bar several months ago was standing fifty feet in front of her.

She was on her fifth glass of champagne.

"You look positively miserable," a velvety voice rang through the bubbly mist that enveloped her head. It was Joan offering her another glass of champagne and an understanding smile.

But Blair didn't feel much like professing her woes. "I prefer to be surrounded by strangers in masks on New Years Eve," she said.

Joan seemed to appreciate this. "My kind of girl. Ten years go. I'll bet you can scoop up a bachelor here somewhere. Even if he's someone else's date."

Blair managed to huff out a smile as Joan playfully nudged an elbow against her arm.

"Who's that?" Blair asked her, nodded over to the man in question, who was schmoozing easily with Pete and Ken.

Blair was preparing herself for _playwright _or _published a novella that caught the eye of the New Yorker_. _He knows so-and-so and runs in so-and-so's circle. _

"I guess that's the new hire. Something…Humphrey," Joan said.

"Dan…" Blair said absentmindedly as she studied him.

"That's it! Did Peggy tell you?"

He was entertaining the hell out of the account men, eliciting a laugh about every fifteen seconds and suddenly Blair felt nauseated.

"Is he…Creative?" Blair said and swallowed the lump in her throat.

"Bingo! Pete stole him from BBDO. I think he's a catch…aesthetically speaking," Joan said in that bombshell voice of hers which was just enough to send Blair excusing herself to the ladies' room.

Her breaths were shallow. They were rapid and shallow and she gripped the His and Hers sink and steadied herself in front of the mirror. It was hard. She was drunk. She could hear the muffled chords of "The Taxman" playing through the walls. Breathing. In. Out. Deep. Into the diaphragm.

Soon a welcome stasis settled around her and the sink and the mirror. She stared blankly ahead, barely making a correlation to her own being and the gold eye shadowed lids gleaming back at her. Without conscious thought she brought the tips of her fingers to her heart and made a criss-cross tracing against her dress.

"Son of a bitch," she whispered and squeezed the sink harder until her knuckles turned white.

She lost her grip when the latch of the door jolted open and she jumped to attention.

"Oh, so sorry," Pete Campbell's voice filled the small room. He made a move to pull the door shut where he had disturbed the threshold of the bathroom but paused and stuck his head inside. It bobbled there without a body and looked utterly bizarre to Blair. "Are you all right?" he asked, dripping with concern.

Blair's lips were sealed shut, so she gave a curt nod.

"My word, you look completely white," he observed and hurried into the room and shut the door behind him.

"I'm fine, really," Blair said and lifted her head high. "Just…" she waived her hand carelessly in the air. "Too much champagne."

The nonchalant act backfired on her when her heel wobbled and her ankle rolled. Suddenly she felt a reaffirming hand snake around her waist and steady her.

"Whoa there," Pete said. He brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear and lingered, taking time to break his eye contact. "Here," he said softly and finally turned away. He returned with a glass of water from the tap and he took his time slipping his hand from it even after she had assured its safe handoff into her own grasp.

"Thank you," she said and placed the glass down.

"You're exquisite," he hummed and leaned forward some more, hovered over her so she had to bend her back to retain some personal space.

Blair, who was accustomed to such attention (if not any follow through), had the sense to dance a sly smile across her lips. "I know," she said impishly.

"And not too modest," he observed and moved closer. "I like that in a woman."

She could feel his breath. "Mr. Campbell," she began and brought two fingers to his lips to stop their descent. "If you're looking to be rewarded for your kindness—"

"From what I've heard a reward system isn't necessary to—"

"What you've heard?" Blair countered in alarm.

"Calm down, I won't say a peep," Pete admonished. "Cross my heart."

And then he softly traced a criss-cross symbol right above her heaving chest.

* * *

Needing to escape from the constant performance of charming his new bosses and colleagues, Dan had managed to slip away to the sidewalk outside of the Drapers' apartment complex for a cigarette.

He'd just started humming Bob Dylan's "Pledging My Time" when a flurry of shimmering gold barreled through the glass doors and right passed him. A pretty mess of a brunette desperate for a cab, but she had no coat.

Dan watched her for a minute, minding his own business as her desperation bled out of her and into the erratic movements of her extended arm. After another minute he felt a pang of guilt at remaining a spectator.

He stepped forward. "Uhhh, miss? Pardon me, but I don't think you'll flag down a cab like that, no matter how pretty you may be—"

She whipped around suddenly to face him and "—oh! Hi," he said at the sight of Blair Waldorf's clumped mascara and red nose facing him. He'd been eyeing her all night; it was just like him not to have even noticed what she was wearing. The line of her jaw, the deep pools of her eyes, rosy cheeks and her entitled pout had occupied him just fine as he had kept tabs on her as if that would somehow contain her from noticing him. He thought it had, actually.

"Hi?" she asked sardonically. "Hi?"

Dan was lost. He furrowed his brow and raised the hand holding his cigarette into a brusque waive.

"Let me get one thing clear, Dan…it is…Dan, correct?" she asked.

"It is," he said, confused by her aggressiveness.

Blair yanked the cigarette from between his fingers and threw it to the side of the street. She tilted towards him like a lion ready to pounce into an attack. All he could see were the black pupils of her eyes.

"_You_ don't say hi to me. You don't say anything to me. We don't speak. _Ever._ I see you in the office in two days and you mean nothing to me but a fly on the wall. You have something to say about my pitches, you address the room as a whole. You do not—under any circumstances—request the same project that I am on. And that means even if it's goddamn Chevrolet, do you understand?"

"Listen, I—" he began.

"_Do _you understand?" she repeated, slowly and forcefully with each syllable.

Dan threw up his hands in surrender. "I do," he said quietly and pivoted away, finished with his smoke break and decided it was best he found the party again before midnight.

It turned out the clock struck twelve while he was waiting for the elevator. He could see her through the lobby's glass windows still waiting for a cab.

Hello 1967.

* * *

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